volatile
by goodviibes
Summary: In which Harry Potter & Ron Weasley are friends with Draco Malfoy, Blaise Zabini & Theodore Nott / In all her six years, she's never interacted with Draco Malfoy before — but now he's everywhere, harassing her and mocking her and making her wish she could kill him with her bare hands. (She also wishes she could kiss him to death, too — but that's not important.)


word count:4,049

* * *

**volatile**

I. good days & bad days

* * *

Dean's so strange, she thinks, making her way towards the Gryffindor table.

There he is, sitting smack center of the table and surrounded, as per usual, with his Quidditch buddies. Neville's at his side, of course, looking awkward as the many frogs he owns.

Neville's not his best friend, no — but they are good friends. And Dean never fails to make that clear, seeing as he sits by the young lad every eating period to demonstrate his never-ending loyalty to the klutz. (Personally, Hermione thinks he does this to get girls.)

Anyways, back to the subject — Dean's so strange. Right now, he's stabbing a loaf of bread with a menacing look in his eye, as if the bread had accidentally poisoned his mother.

It's quite uncomfortable, in her opinion.

She has half a mind to turn around and head back to the comfort of Hogwarts' library. The other half of her brain demands her to go over there and separate Dean from the knife he is gripping seemingly too tight. He's going to get himself hurt, she decides.

With that train of thought, she gears herself to go around the table and head over to Dean. Before she can take a step, however, a hand reaches out and roughly pulls her down to sit.

"Ginny!" She yells, exasperated at the sudden movement. Hermione glares at the ginger and reaches up to tighten her pony-tail, an old not-so-nervous habit she picked up as a child. Ginny waves off her annoyance easily and moves closer to Hermione. She leans in towards the shell of the brunette's ear and cups her mouth for dramatic effects, and whispers, "Best not to interrupt Dean, 'Mione. He's in sort of a fit right now, as you can see."

Hermione rolls her eyes — what else is new. "What happened, now?"

Ginny leans back, probably too tired from hunching over to whisper in her ear, and says with amusement, "Oh you know, the usual — my brother and his gits of friends insulted Dean and his friends. Somebody mentioned Quidditch and that must've fueled the flames. Blah, blah, blah. I don't see what's the big deal," She says that part a little quieter, for the sake of no one else (those Quidditch boys, especially) listening onto their conversations.

"But this time," she continues telling her friend. "Dean's really mad. He's been stabbing that bread ever since we've sat down. I think Ron might've mentioned our last game against the Slytherins to Dean. Either him or Nott."

Hermione frowns. Stupid boys and their stupid egos. She just didn't understand the logic of trying to wave in someone's face your own accomplishments. It's just so childish to make someone feel inferior to you — and immoral.

She feels very strongly about this, as anyone can guess, due to the enormous amount of crap she gets for being a "mudblood" (Malfoy's words).

And stupid Ron for goading on Dean. That boy has the amount of intelligence as the jellybeans he eats from those candy, joke stores in Hogsmeade, yet he still has the audacity to try to make people feel bad about themselves. He is a vulgar boy whom manages to do nothing but annoy her immensely. Especially when he's with his partner-in-crime, Theodore Nott.

"It amazes me every time when I think back to how you two are related." Hermione responds, making a grab for some spaghetti (it _is_ lunch). Ginny groans at the statement and slams her head down on the wooden table. "Ugh, don't remind me.

"He's impossible, I swear." Ginny lifts her head up and watches Hermione eat. "It's like he tries to be an asshole just to fit in. First it was Harry, following around that boy like he's Odin or something, and now it's Malfoy! Merlin, it's embarrassing, watching him kiss Malfoy's ass like that—"

Draco Malfoy.

He's that rich, blonde-hair boy that thinks pure-bloods are the dominating class. He's difficult to inquire, honestly.

Hermione's never had more than five sentences with that boy. He doesn't do anything to her — and it's not cause he's a good person, either. He genuinely believes Hermione Granger is below him and therefore does not spare her a word or a glance, unless the situation demands it. It's like she isn't even worth it.

She's heard stories about him, though. How he's cruel, and rude, and cunning, and difficult, and dangerous, and _beautiful_ — really, the list goes on. But it's not as if she focuses on the rumors anyways. To her, he's a stranger. He's nothing to her, as she is to him.

"—and I can't even look at him over break, you know, when he's off being an asshole to our relatives and such. And then he brings over Harry, who invites Malfoy, and where Malfoy goes, Zabini goes and somehow Nott gets ahold of the meet up, and it's like a big whole asshole event at the Weasely house, and—"

"Gin, _Gin_..." Hermione places a warming hand on her friend's shoulder. Ginny's face is starting to look a little red. "slow down, you're starting to match the strawberries on Neville's right."

Ginny takes a few long breathes and waits for the heat to leave her face. "Sorry 'bout that. It's just the holidays are coming up,"

"Time seems to fly by, huh?" Hermione pops a lone raspberry into her mouth.

"A little too quick, if you ask me." Ginny replies, wrinkling her freckle-covered nose. "Anyways, are you going to Hogsmeade tomorrow?"

"I plan to — all of my homework for the next three weeks are seemingly done so that gives me time for some shopping." Hermione says right before Ginny pounces her ("Yay!") in excitement.

A catcall from their right causes them to break apart and of course it's Dean. Hermione flicks a green pea at him, good-naturely. "Sorry Dean but this isn't one of your messed up sexual fantasies."

Dean chuckles at her insult, and moves down the wooden bench, closer to the pair, dragging Neville along. "Oh how disappointing. And here I thought we would finally see some girl-on-girl action between the two of you, right Neville?"

Said boy became red-faced at the topic of conversation. Hermione giggled slightly at the boy's innocence, which seemed to stretch farther than her own. "U-Uh, I-I don't think their lesbians, Dean."

"It wouldn't be as hot, if they were." Dean cheekily replies. "Imagine it Nev — two lonely best friends who want to experiment a little with one another, indulge in that warmth of the infamous cuddle season, seeing as winter is right around the corner."

Ginny threw her own group of peas at the Gryffindor seeker. "Oh shut it Dean, or I might have to bring up your dirty dreams about getting it on with poor Neville."

"Who wouldn't want to get it on with Neville? Bloody Hell, have you seen the boy?" He made such dramatic movements with his hands that only served to make Neville turn red with discomfort. Hermione couldn't help but let out a flurry of giggles; it was highly amusing watching Dean, one of Hogwarts' heartthrobs, hit on meek Neville.

For now, the topic of the school bullies have been forgotten. Dean's fit of anger has been suppressed and the loaf of bread has been granted some peace, as four teens continue to enjoy their lunch.

ooo

Ginny used to have a thing for Harry Potter.

Hermione remembers all those times spent in third-year (when Ginny was a mere second-year) listening to the redhead droan on and on about how "his glasses make him look so sophisticated" and how "he's so different from the others 'Mione" or how Ginny's "so glad he's friends with my brother — that's about the only good thing regarding Ronald."

Needless to say, it didn't end well for the little Weasley.

Thinking back, Hermione reasons that Harry must've known of Ginny's feelings somehow; he's just sly like that. He probably didn't think there was any need to address the girl's feelings and opted to ignore it.

And she understood why he would think that — it wasn't as if Ginny had been knocking on his door asking for a date in the library or by the lake.

No, Ginny was the type to appreciate him from afar and observe his every movement with a hopeful sigh.

And for the most part, Harry seemed polite to Ginny. There were multiple occassions when she saw the young lad give a small nod in acknowledgement to the younger girl when they were walking down the halls. Overall, Ginny and Harry's relationship was no more than defined as aquaintances.

That didn't stop the breaking of Ginny's heart one night, when she had unfortunately walked in one Harry receiving head from a random Hufflepuff.

Hermione remembered how the girl retelled the story with a betrayed look on her tear-stricken face.

It took Ginny half a year to get over him and that was how Hermione realized how serious Ginny's one-sided love was.

She's over it now, thank Merlin, but it's still obvious that she sees Harry in a different light than the other boys.

ooo

Hermione has potions after lunch with Dean and Neville. Ginny's a year lower than them so it's very rare to recieve classes with the ginger.

She walks into the classroom with her boys by her side with a happy grin on her face. Despite the fact that it's located in the dungeons and the seasons shifting only manages to emphasize the cool draft of air does not damper her spirits.

"Luna!" Hermione calls out to the blonde, who's already situated in her assigned seat. The girl turns around at the calling of her name and shoots the trio a dreamy smile.

Luna's the last member of their five-squad group. Though she's in another house and is never seen with the other four during eating time, their individual bond with the petite girl has never wavered.

"Lovegood!" Dean calls out, sliding onto the stool right next to Luna. "Haven't seen your lovely face since yesterday, now why is that?"

"Oh, I seemed to have missplaced all of my textbooks today, and so I spent all of breakfast and lunch putting up flyers for my missing supplies." Her voice held no contempt but the others around her tensed at the situation.

Sure people have been harrassing Luna since forever ago, but that didn't make it any easier to digest.

"Did you manage to find it Luna?" Hermione asks gently after tightening her pony-tail once more. Luna nods happily at her question and gesters to the large pile of books on her desk. "The gnarles managed to locate it out on the Quidditch field right before lunch ended. I'm so very glad."

"So you didn't manage to eat anything Luna?" Neville asks, not hiding his worry tone in the slightest. Luna didn't get to answer before Neville swipes at his pocket and fishes out a chocolate frog. "It's not much, but here ya' go."

Hermione watches as Luna shoots the boy a dazzling smile before accepting the snack, not noticing the sudden blush appearing on Neville's face.

Neville's always had a crush on Luna Lovegood. She's pretty and sweet and familiar — it's obvious to anyone with eyes how much he fancies her. Obvious to everyone except for Luna.

Sometimes she thinks Luna's just like Harry — she's aware but doesn't seem to know what to do with the information. But Hermione can never tell with the Ravenclaw fifth-year.

(They're all in sixth-year right now, aside from Ginny and Luna. This potions class is meant for Slytherin and Gryffindor sixth-years but somehow Luna managed her way into the class.)

Dean makes kissy faces behind Luna, who's happily munching on her chocolate. Neville spends the next couple of minutes staring at the girl of his dreams. Hermione makes her way towards her seat in the back, as people were finally shuffling into the classroom, ready to start the lesson.

As expected, not a minute later, the swoosh of Professor Snape's cloak is heard and in comes the grim-looking teacher.

ooo

"Man, he's such a sack of shit, huh?" Theodore Nott remarks, staring at Dean Thomas with detest in his eyes. "Look at that faggot...passing notes with Flora Carrow — _hah_, as if she'd ever sleep with one of those filthy Gryffindors."

When he didn't hear a response from his friend, Theo turned around with one eye-brow stretched in confusion. "Draco?"

The blonde tenses at the calling of his name and focuses his attention on Theo. "What?"

"What are you staring at, Drake?"

"The board, idiot" Draco drawls out, rolling his eyes in annoyance. "One of us has to pay attention or else we're both gonna fuck up. And you're too boy-obsessed over Thomas, so once again it's up to me."

"Hey, fuck you!" Theo sneers at him, forcing himself to whisper lest Snape might catch them. He lowers his head to make himself seem less noticeable. "I am _not _obsessed, got it? That queer is just fucking creasing me lately, that's _all_."

Draco snorts at the answer. What a load of shit —

Nott has been going on about Thomas since the year began, always with "his Quidditch skills are shit" and "I wish I could fucking kill the little queer already." Bullocks, if Draco didn't know any better, he would say Theo sort of fancied the Thomas boy, in a creepy-hate-love homosexual way.

Really, it was giving him a headache. "Whatever. Just stop you're bitching and pay attention. I don't know what the fuck is going on."

"Relax, relax..." Theo had gone back to glaring at the Gryffindor seeker. "It's not like Snape is ever gonna fail us, you're like his favorite. He probably masturbates to the thought of you passing his class."

"You're a sick fuck, you know that?"

"And if you're really worried," Theo continued, unfazed. "We'll have Lovegood do our potion for us. She looks like she knows one-fifth of what's going on."

Draco takes a peek at the crazy blonde, who was reading one of her Quibbler magazines that was printed upside-down for some reason. He shook his head at the sight; the bitch was crazy.

Whatever. Fuck it.

He decides to just lean back and take a nap, too tired to try to understand the mess Snape was vomiting up for them to learn today. He gives a quick flick of magic onto his quill, jinxing it to take notes without the need of his assistance and made himself comfortable, slowly letting his eyes fall shut...

ooo

"I'm tired of seeing your faces," Snape drawls towards the end of their lessons. "I'm going to run some errands and in the meantime, I expect all of you to create the potion _correctly,_" He shot a glare at Neville. "and do remember to turn it two times counter-clockwise and end it off with a drizzle of dragon-breath."

And with that, he leaves the class.

"He was in a nice mood today." Luna says to Dean, her seat partner, with a smile on her face. Dean only stares at her with wide eyes. "Luna...he took off 100 points from Gryffindor today, just because I told you you're quill had dropped."

"I think you just see the cup half-empty," It was a well-known muggle saying, and Dean was quite familiar with it, but the way Luna references it with her wonder-filled voice, made it seem foreign and unknown to the young lad.

"Let's just get to work," He decides. They only had thirty-minutes left of class. Thankfully it's the last lesson of the day.

It was going well for the first half — Luna typically controlled the whole potion-lab today, instructing Dean left and right on what to do next. Thank Merlin he has her as his partner. Despite her strangeness, Luna's intelligence was quite remarkable, almost as remarkable as Hermione.

"...and next it says we add in a snip of troll's fungus — though the gnarles have informed me that the fungus is out. Maybe we should ask Her—" Luna stops mid-sentence as Theodore slams the palm of his hands on their table, a half-grin, half-smirk plastered on his pimple-less face. "Lovegood, how goes it?"

She smiles; he's so very polite. "Very well Theodore. Thank you fo—"

"Yeah, yeah sure. I'm good too. Anyways, I happened to hear among the others that you are fresh out of troll's fungus, and I, fortunately, have it in my possession! Why not help one another out?" He gives this sickly sweet smile in hopes of persuading the blonde and Dean has to hold back a gag.

"No thanks fuck-Nott," Dean answers for his friend. "We're just gon'a ask good old Hermione. I'm pretty sure hers ain't infected by some rare sexual diseases that even our magical healers have yet to find a cure for." He gives a knowing glance to the Slytherin. "So, you can go fuck off now, thanks."

"Hey Thomas—if you didn't noticed, I was talking to the lady, not her little lapdog." Theo responds not even sparing him a glance. "So go fuck off now, _thanks._

"So, Luna...how 'bout it? My troll's fungus given all to you for the price of helping me and Draco out?"

Luna thinks for a moment. She _does _love helping people. And it's really nice to interact with Theodore when he's not off stealing her possessions and slamming her into walls. "Okay, I would love to help."

"Excellent!" Theo smacks the palms of his hands together and shoots another smile at Dean. He's about to lead her to Draco and his's table when Dean shoots his arm at and drags her back towards his side.

"Sorry Theowhore but Luna's got to help me finish our potions first." Dean pushes the younger girl behind him to barricade her from Theo.

Theo rolls his eyes. "Look, I know you're a big fucking idiot who doesn't know how to get the wax out of his ears, but Luna's gon'a help me for a little bit, so why won't you go kiss some other person's ass? Like Granger; she needs somebody stupid to help."

He shifts his focus on the blonde hiding behind Dean. "Now Luna, _let's go._ We've only got fifteen more minutes," He grabs the base of her pale arms "and I want nothing less than an O."

"Stop fucking terrorizing my friend!" Dean yells, pushing the slimey git away from Luna. "Go suck Snape's dick for that O, you little bitch."

"Fuck you! I ain't gon'a stoop down your level." Theo slams Dean into the edge of the desk. "Everyone knows that's your job!"

"Actually, it's your mum's, fucker" His back is throbbing, cause fucking Nott forced the edge to scrape into his back. Dean doesn't really notice the amount of people surrounding them, only the blood pumping in his ears, his adrenaline spiked.

"Don't talk about my mum," Theo sneers, pushing Theo, who was stumbling to push himself away from the desk, once again.

Dean laughs mockingly, despite colliding into another desk. He gives thanks to his seeker skills seeing as he successfully managed to dodge the spilling potion. "Okay, let's talk about your Death-Eater of a dad, Nott. How many people has he killed today? Hm...one, two—"

He doesn't get to finish his little insult, seeing as a pair of knuckles slam into his right cheek. "Shut the fuck up!"

Damn, the hit caused him to fall right on his ass. Man, how embarrassing.

Luna's right by his side, trying to catch his fall. She doesn't help at all, and all he sees are little black spots. Whoever punched him was a strong motherfucker; it pushed him a couple feet back and he crashed into the supply cabinet.

"Stop it! All of you!" That's Hermione, if he guesses right. He remembers how he saw her walk out a couple minutes ago before the fighting happened, probably went to find Snape to inform him on the lack of ingredients. Dean didn't even notice her coming back.

He hears a faint yell of "Dean!" and a mutter of some spell before his body is lifted up from the air, dangling like an idiot. His vision clears and Dean can see Malfoy wiping his knuckles on his cloak (it's same to assume that Malfoy, that bastard, had hit him) and Nott standing by the blonde's side with his wand directed at Dean's figure. Neville's somewhere off at the side, looking like he's about to piss himself. Luna's staring in awe at him hovering in the air. And judging the look on Hermione's face, she's probably debating internally on whether to interfere or run to get Snape.

Fuck, this is _really embarrassing._

"I can't believe I had to use my hands. You owe me Theo," Draco drags out a long sigh. He just woke up from his little nap, and drowsiness and annoyance emitted from the sixth-year Slytherin.

"Yeah, yeah I'll keep that gesture in my heart forever." Theo mockingly places his hand on his chest.

"Theo!" It was Hermione. "Put him down!"

Theo laughs at the look on her face, so serious. "What are ya' gon'a do about it Granger? Write an essay to Dumbledore?"

"Put. him. _down,_" And just like that, she whips out her own wand. "Or I swear, I'm gonna—"

"Oh, just shut the fuck up already, you filthy mudblood." It's Draco this time, and Dean marvels at the rare chance of seeing them interact with each other - they usually never speak with each other. "It's not as if Theo give's a rat's ass on what you have to say."

That's when Neville runs up to the center of the scene. Damn, the blood must be getting to his head - shy little Neville is making a scene? "She's- She's not a mu- mudblood!" He screams, face red and looking ready to faint. And then he proceeds to lift a stool and makes an effort to throw it at Dean's harassers. Of course, the klutz only manages to let the stool fall backwards, which only succeeded in scaring the crap out of Luna and putting her in harm's way.

Immediately Neville rushes by Luna's side, sputtering apologizes along the way, while ignoring the brutal laughter coming from the majority of the class. Dean sees Malfoy approaching his clumsy friend and if he wasn't flipped upside down in the air, with blood flowing the wrong direction, he might've found the strength to call out for Neville to watch out.

Luck just wasn't on his side today, and the moment Neville turned around, he suffered Malfoy's crushing knuckles slamming into the side of his face.

And it was this exact moment that Professor Snape came tumbling in, with McGonagall in tow. "What in Salazar's hell is going on here?!"

Well fuck.

* * *

**I hope you liked it. Sorry if some things are unclear or OOC. **


End file.
